+ jp FREY en camisole +

les pyromanes

Un pyromane est une personne atteinte d'un trouble psychologique caractérisé par une pulsion irrépressible et une fascination morbide pour le feu. Contrairement aux incendiaires criminels, ils n'agissent pas par intérêt financier, vengeance ou politique, mais pour évacuer une tension interne et ressentir un soulagement. 

souvenir from the Ocean

based on: The White Crane Institute's 'Gay Wisdom', Gay Birthdays, Gay For Today, Famous GLBT, glbt-Gay Encylopedia, Today in Gay History, Wikipedia, and more …

August 17

1893 – On this date Mae West, the American actress, sex-positive, gender-blurry icon, was born (d.1980). West was born Mary Jane West in Bushwick, Brooklyn, delivered at home by an aunt who was a midwife. She was eldest surviving child of John Patrick West and Matilda "Tillie" Doelger, who had emigrated with her family from Bavaria.At five years old, West first entertained a crowd, at a church social, and she started appearing in amateur shows at the age of seven. She often won prizes at local talent contests. She began performing professionally in vaudeville in the Hal Clarendon Stock Company in 1907 at the age of fourteen. West first performed under the stage name Baby Mae, and tried various personas including a male impersonator, Sis Hopkins, and a blackface coon shouter. She was was said to have been inspired or influenced by female impersonators Bert Savoy and Julian Eltinge, who were famous during the Pansy Craze. Her first appearance in a legitimate Broadway show was in a 1911 revue A La Broadway put on by her former dancing teacher, Ned Wayburn. The show folded after just eight performances. She then appeared in a show called Vera Violetta, whose cast featured Al Jolson.

Her famous walk was said to have originated in her early years as a stage actress. West had special eight-inch platforms attached to her shoes to increase her height and enhance her stage presence. Though she had not yet matured, the slinky, dark-haired Mae was already performing a lascivious "shimmy" dance in 1913 and was photographed for a song-sheet for the song "Everybody Shimmies Now." She was encouraged as a performer by her mother, who, according to West, always thought that whatever her daughter did was fantastic.

She began writing her own risqué plays using the pen name "Jane Mast." Her first starring role on Broadway was in a play she titled Sex, which she also wrote, produced and directed. Though critics hated the show, ticket sales were good. The notorious production did not go over well with city officials and the theater was raided with West arrested along with the cast. She was prosecuted on morals charges and, on April 19, 1927, was sentenced to 10 days in jail for public obscenity. While incarcerated on Welfare Island (now Roosevelt Island), she was allowed to wear her silk panties instead of the scratchy prison issue and the warden reportedly took her to dinner every night. She served eight days with two days off for good behavior. Media attention to the case enhanced her career.

Her next play, The Drag, was about homosexuality and alluded to the work of Karl Heinrich Ulrichs. It was a box office success but it played in New Jersey because it was banned from Broadway. West regarded talking about sex as a basic human rights issue and was also an early advocate of homosexual rights. She famously told policemen who were raiding a Gay bar, "Don't you know you're hitting a woman in a man's body?" — a daring statement at a time when homosexuality was not accepted. During her entire lifetime she surrounded herself with Gay men and stood up for Gay rights at any and every opportunity.

In 1932, West was offered a motion picture contract by Paramount Pictures, when she was 38 years old (although she kept her age ambiguous for several more years). She made her film debut in Night After Night starring George Raft. At first, she did not like her small role in Night After Night, but was appeased when she was allowed to rewrite her scenes. In West's first scene, a hat check girl exclaims, "Goodness, what beautiful diamonds." West replies, "Goodness had nothing to do with it, dearie." Reflecting on the overall result of her rewritten scenes, Raft is said to have remarked, "She stole everything but the cameras."

She brought her Diamond Lil character, now renamed Lady Lou, to the screen in She Done Him Wrong (1933). The film is also notable as one of Cary Grant's first major roles, which boosted his career. West claimed she spotted Grant at the studio and insisted that he be cast as the male lead. The film was a box office hit and earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Picture. The success of the film most likely saved Paramount from bankruptcy.

She appeared in a series of hits, many of which caused controversy because of their risque nature. They included I'm No Angel, Klondike Annie, and Go West Young Man. In 1939, Universal Pictures approached West to star in a film opposite W. C. Fields. Having left Paramount eighteen months earlier and looking for a comeback film, West accepted the role of Flower Belle Lee in the film My Little Chickadee (1940). Despite their intense mutual dislike, and fights over the screenplay, My Little Chickadee was a box office success, outgrossing Fields' previous films.

West appeared in her last movie during the studio age with The Heat's On (1943) for Columbia. She remained active during the ensuing years. Among her stage performances was the title role in Catherine Was Great (1944) on Broadway, in which she spoofed the story of Catherine the Great of Russia, surrounding herself with an "imperial guard" of muscular young actors, all over six feet tall. The play was produced by Mike Todd and went on a long national tour in 1945. She also starred in her own Las Vegas stage show, singing while surrounded by bodybuilders.

When Billy Wilder offered West the role of Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard, she refused and pronounced herself offended at being asked to play a "has-been," similar to the responses he received from Mary Pickford, Greta Garbo, and Pola Negri. Ultimately the more amenable Gloria Swanson was cast in the role. In 1958, West appeared at the Academy Awards and performed the song "Baby, It's Cold Outside" with Rock Hudson. Her autobiography, titled Goodness Had Nothing To Do With It, was published by Prentice-Hall in 1959.

The famous West quip "Is that a gun in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?" is accurately attributed to her. She made it in February 1936, at the train station in Los Angeles upon her return from Chicago, when a Los Angeles police officer was assigned to escort her home. She first delivered the line on film in My Little Chickadee, and again to George Hamilton in her last movie, Sextette. It is one of the most quoted lines in movie history. Another favorite, said to Ezra Pound, no less, "An ounce of erection is worth a pound of allure."

After a 26-year absence from motion pictures, she appeared in the role of Leticia Van Allen in Gore Vidal's Myra Breckinridge (1970) with John Huston, Raquel Welch, Rex Reed, Farrah Fawcett, and Tom Selleck in a small part. This movie failed at the box office, despite popular excitement. It became a camp classic, however, due to its sex change theme. It has since been re-released several times doing much better than originally and has also had successful multiple releases on DVD and VHS. Near the end of her life, she was known for maintaining a surprisingly youthful appearance. She stated in her autobiography that she spent two hours every day massaging cold cream into her breasts to keep them youthful. West continued to surround herself with virile men for the rest of her life, employing hunky companions, bodyguards and chauffeurs. Mae West is buried, with her family, in Cypress Hills Cemetery, Brooklyn, New York.

1907 – Roger Peyrefitte (d.2000) was born in Castres in south western France and educated in Catholic boarding schools in the region. The most lasting effect of this religious education was his life-long hostility to the Roman Catholic Church. He went on to study at the University of Toulouse and in Paris.

He had his first homosexual experience at eighteen and thereafter led an active sex life, hunting for teenage boys across Europe. He also had occasional affairs with women, whom (by his own account) he introduced to the delights of anal sex.

Peyrefitte entered the French diplomatic service in 1931 and served as secretary at the French embassy in Athens from 1933 to 1938. Forced to resign in October 1940 because of his relations with a fourteen-year-old boy, he was recalled to duty three years later to serve the collaborationist Vichy government in German-occupied Paris.

After the Liberation, France's provisional government dismissed him on suspicion of collaborationism in February 1945. Peyrefitte later appealed his dismissal and the Council of State finally ruled in his favour in 1962, but the Foreign Ministry refused to reintegrate him. He was by then, in any case, a professional writer with no desire to return to state service.

Peyrefitte's first, best, and best-known novel, Les Amitiés Particulières (Special Friendships), tells the story of love between two teenage boys in a Catholic boarding school. The book may have been based on his own experience. Peyrefitte later explained, 'I was a young diplomat, and I wanted to show the origin of those things: [i.e. homosexuality] that it was not simply under the influence of a disgusting adult that young boys could feel that sort of attraction.'

Critically well-received, the novel won the Prix Renaudot. It caused a first scandal when it appeared in 1944 and a second when made into a movie in 1964. During the making of the film, Peyrefitte befriended a fourteen-year-old extra, Alain-Philippe Malagnac, who eventually became the great love of his life as well as his secretary and business partner.

In the course of his long life (he died at 93), Peyrefitte published dozens of books, including numerous novels, a three-volume fictionalised biography of Alexander the Great, and two volumes on Voltaire (whom he claimed to have been homosexual). He also wrote about Baron Jacques d'Adelsward-Fersen's exile in Capri (L'Exilé de Capri, 1959) and translated Greek pederastic love poetry.

Much of his work provoked scandal for his wide-ranging accusations and implications that various people (and popes) were homosexuals, Nazi-collaborators, or both.

In his memoirs Propos Secrets, he wrote extensively about his youth, his sex life (homosexual mainly and a few affairs with women), his years as a diplomat, his travels to Greece and Italy,] and his troubles with the police for sexually harassing male teenagers.

In two volumes of oral memoirs (1977 and 1980), he divulged the secrets (especially sexual) of numerous celebrities, including himself. Among those he portrayed in a negative light were Alain Delon, André Gide, and Marcel Proust.

Peyrefitte appeared to value the commercial success of his books far more than he cared about their quality.

Peyrefitte was certainly no radical gay liberationist, but he did support gay businesses - he financed a gay nightclub, Le Colony, and Paris's first gay sex bar, Le Bronx, both of which opened on the Rue Sainte-Anne in late 1973.

His political views were deeply conservative: 'I have a profound respect for order. . . . I hate all revolutionary movements. . . . I am too bourgeois . . . to approve of . . . the enemies of the bourgeoisie.' In his last years, he came out in open support of the extreme right-wing politician Jean-Marie Le Pen and his xenophobic and homophobic party, the National Front.

Peyrefitte died on November 5, 2000, in Paris, after a long battle with Parkinson's disease.

Wesley Eure, Then and Now

1951 – Wesley Eure is an American actor, singer, author, producer, director, charity fundraiser, and lecturer. He is best known for appearing as Michael Horton on the American soap opera Days of Our Lives from 1974 to 1981, during which he also starred on the popular children's television series Land of the Lost. He later hosted the popular children's game show Finders Keepers in 1987 and 1988, and co-created the children's educational television show Dragon Tales in 1999. He subsequently published several books (for children and adult), and has produced plays and raised funds for HIV/AIDS and other causes.

Eure wanted to be an actor since the age of five. While the family lived in Illinois, he enrolled in a summer program at Northwestern University, where he took acting lessons. His first break came when he was 17 years old and working part-time at the New Frontier Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas selling artwork. He was hired as a driver for Robert Goulet and Carol Lawrence during their summer tour. He spent most of 1968 and 1969 as their driver.

Eure moved to Los Angeles in 1973 after discovering it was cheaper to live there but offered just as much opportunity to become an actor. He was hired to star in a pilot for a Kaye Ballard TV series, The Organic Vegetables, created and produced by the team behind The Monkees. When that series was not picked up due to the 1973 writers' strike, Eure answered an ad in an industry trade publication to audition for a television show. He learned that David Cassidy was threatening to leave The Partridge Family, and that the audition was for a role as a "neighbor boy" who would take over the lead in the family band from Cassidy. Eure won the audition, but never joined the show. Why is not clear, as Eure has said that Cassidy agreed to stay on the show but also that the show was canceled before the next season started.

Although his acting career seemed stalled, Eure continued to sing. He became friends with Shaun Cassidy and Leif Garrett, and some of his music was produced by Bobby Sherman. Motown Records placed him under contract, and he was in a boy band whose music was produced by Mike Curb. He also sang a few times with the Jackson Five.

In 1974, Eure tried out for and won a role on NBC's Days of Our Lives. Eure had previously met producer Sid Krofft and committed to do an audition for a new children's show he was working on. Eure flew to New York City at the request of Broadway producer David Merrick to try out for a role in a theatrical production of Candide, and didn't want to audition for Krofft due to his commitment to Days and because he'd be playing a 16-year-old boy. But Eure auditioned and won the role of Will Marshall on Land of the Lost. He kept his commitment to both shows after the Kroffts repeatedly asked him to star on Land of the Lost.

Although Eure had sexual relationships with women, he knew he was homosexual. He met movie star Richard Chamberlain in the early 1970s, and they entered into a serious relationship in 1975. According to Eure, the two men lived together until their breakup in 1976, after which Chamberlain met his long-term partner Martin Rabbett. During this time, Eure says, he lived a fairly open life with Chamberlain, with many of his co-stars, producers, and crew aware of their relationship and Eure's homosexuality. Eure says of the relationship, "It broke my heart. I was destroyed. I was a kid, and he was a much older guy. ... I remember we broke up and I was on Days of Our Lives, I couldn’t stop shaking. I was crying so hard. I was a kid, comparatively. I went to the studio that day, and I was sobbing in the dressing room."

Eure was fired from Days of Our Lives in 1981. According to Eure, he was given many reasons for the cancellation of his contract after nine years on the show. But Eure says he believes the real reason was his homosexuality, which attracted attention and threatened more deeply closeted producers and actors. Years later, Eure says he met Earl Greenburg, the head of NBC's daytime programming division at the time he was fired. Greenburg confirmed that Eure was fired because of rumors about his homosexuality. Eure also says one of the stars of Days of Our Lives confirmed that Eure's sexuality was the cause of his dimissal.

When Chamberlain was outed by a French magazine in 1989, Eure (who had already been named in one book as a closeted homosexual) feared he would be exposed as well. But with the assistance of a friend at the National Enquirer, Eure's name was kept out of the American tabloid press

Eure did not act in film or television for six years after leaving Days of Our Lives, and attributes this difficulty to Hollywood gossip about his sexual orientation. He continued to sing, however, and had a Las Vegas act at Harrah's casino. During this time, some of his recording was produced by singer Bobby Sherman, but a full album was never completed

It was during the premiere of the Land of the Lost film in 2009 that Eure decided to come out of the closet. He attended the premiere with a friend, Days of Our Lives production assistant Deanne Anders. While on the red carpet, Eure decided he would never again hide his sexuality. Already scheduled to do an interview with the LGBT news and lifestyle Web site AfterElton.com about his HIV/AIDS charity work, Eure decided to come out of the closet in the interview.

During the 1980s, Eure lost most of his gay friends to AIDS—including one of his best friends, the director John Allison. Subsequently, Eure became a fund-raiser for a number of HIV/AIDS causes. He has helped to organize and host the LalaPOOLooza HIV/AIDS fund-raiser in Palm Springs, California, for many years. He has also raised funds for and assisted with Project Angel Food, a nonprofit organization that feeds homebound AIDS patients.

1951 – Robert Joy is a Canadian actor. He is best known for his roles as Dr. Sid Hammerback in CSI: NY, Charlie Houx in Land of the Dead, Lizard in The Hills Have Eyes, Dave in Atlantic City, and Jim in Desperately Seeking Susan.

Joy was born in Montreal, Quebec, Canada and grew up in St. John's, Newfoundland.

Joy played Madonna's punk musician boyfriend Jim in 1985's Desperately Seeking Susan, and the Dutch-Israeli Hans in the 1986 Alliance/CTV production Sword of Gideon, an adaptation of George Jonas's book Vengeance.

In the fall of 2005, Joy joined the CBS police procedural series, CSI: NY, during its second season as a recurring character, Dr. Sid Hammerback, the Chief Medical Examiner, and became a main cast member in season five. Joy stated, "I basically read the script and then look up everything on Wikipedia that I don't know, and try to find out how to pronounce all the long words and get my head around actually what it is that I'm conveying, because often my character has a lot of explaining to do."

In 2006, Joy appeared onscreen in Alexandre Aja's remake of The Hills Have Eyes where he portrays a mutant named Lizard.In addition to his acting, Joy was frequently associated with the Newfoundland-based CODCO, working with the comedy troupe on many of their

pre-television stage shows and appearing as a guest performer in the series. He also co-starred in the 1986 Andy Jones film, The Adventure of Faustus Bidgood, the only film that features the entire cast of CODCO.

He appeared as himself in the 2012 documentary film That Guy... Who Was in That Thing.

Joy is divorced from actress Mary Joy. They have one daughter, Ruby Joy, who is an actress. In the summer of 2011, Joy and his daughter performed together in Shakespeare's The Tempest.

Joy was formerly the partner of actor William Duff-Griffin, who died from prostate cancer on November 13, 1994, and has been in a relationship with Broadway composer Henry Krieger since 1995.

On February 22, 2009, Penn, a heterosexual, received the Academy Award for Best Actor for the film Milk. In his acceptance speech, Penn said

" ... I think that it is a good time for those who voted for the ban against gay marriage to sit and reflect and anticipate their great shame and the shame in their grandchildren's eyes if they continue that way of support. We've got to have equal rights for everyone!"

1969 – An Atlanta art theatre was raided during a showing of Andy Warhol’s film Lonesome Cowboys saying it was a hotbed of homosexuality. Police photographed everyone in attendance as reference material for the vice squad. Written by Paul Morrissey, the film is a satire of Hollywood westerns. It won the Best Film Award at the San Francisco International Film Festival.

1982 – Ryan Driller, aka Jeremy Bilding, is an American pornographic actor, director, and model who has appeared in both straight and gay pornography. In 2016, he received the XBIZ Award for Male Performer of the Year. Men's Health has described him as "one of the biggest names in the industry".

Driller was born and raised in Littleton, Colorado. Driller was a member of the Boy Scouts. At 18, he moved to Key West, Florida, where he lived for seven years. Before entering the adult film industry, he worked as a radio promotions coordinator.

Driller entered the adult film industry after reaching out to agents about performing and receiving replies. He has performed in straight pornography under the name Ryan Driller and in gay pornography under the name Jeremy Bilding. He appeared in an episode of The Burn with Jeff Ross, in which Ross did a comedy skit during one of Driller's porn shoots.

2003 – Died : Herbert Sutcliffe (b.1917), history teacher and decorated World War II veteran - awarded the Member of the Order of the British Empire for bringing his troops back from behind enemy lines at Calais, France, in 1944.

While a 24-year-old lance-corporal posted to Britain, he had his first sexual encounter - with a Canadian Army sergeant - on New Year's Eve, 1941. but as he moved up through the ranks, he took care to avoid sex with military men, fearing it could compromise his authority.

After the war, he returned to his home town to pursue a history degree from the University of Toronto. But in 1950, he passed up graduate school at Yale in order to make the military his professional life. After rising through the ranks for the next dozen years, the ground beneath him fell away on June 1, 1962, leaving his career and personal life in shambles.

On the eve of being transferred to a new post at the Pentagon, he was discharged in 1962 for being gay, one of nearly 400 people who lost their jobs as the result of a 1959-1968 Canadian investigation to weed out homosexuals in the military and civil service becasue they were deemed national security threats.

Major Sutcliffe was in Ottawa that day readying himself for a prestigious post at the Pentagon in Washington when his commanding officer delivered the blow: the army had confirmed that he was a homosexual and, on that basis, was discharging him. Shocked and scared, Sutcliffe went home, had a drink and contemplated suicide.

Despite his feelings of isolation, Sutcliffe was not alone in his misfortune. Between 1959 and 1968, the Security Panel - a committee of RCMP officers and representatives from the Privy Council, National Defence and External Affairs - investigated 9,000 men and women suspected of homosexuality. The panel targeted the civil service, the military and the Mounties, spending millions of dollars in the process -- some of them on such bizarre measures as the "fruit machine," a device designed to differentiate gays from straights. Like Sutcliffe, at least 395 people lost their jobs.

After being drummed out of the military, he returned to Toronto and enrolled in teacher's college, later landing a job teaching history in a high school. In this, he sees more than a little irony: "The military had thrown me out because I'm a homosexual, and here I am teaching 18-, 19-, 20-year-old males." In his post-army life, Sutcliffe chose to keep his sexuality private until he retired in 1979. Finally, he says, "I reached the point where I wouldn't apologize for being gay. That's the way I am, and I'm comfortable with it."

When same-sex marriage became legal in Ontario, Herbert Sutcliffe and Ralph Wormleighton, his partner of 30 years, didn't rush to the altar. "We didn't see any point in our doing it. In terms of income tax, we were already regarded as a couple, and our wills and powers-of-attorney were drawn up to reflect that."

2009 – On this date the Durham, North Carolina city council received a standing ovation when it unanimously passed, without discussion, a resolution supporting civil marriage for same-sex couples. "It is simply a statement" and has no effect on the law, City Attorney Patrick Baker said before the vote. Nevertheless, when the outcome was announced much of the full-house audience in the council chamber broke into applause and then stood. The resolution states: "The City Council of the City of Durham endorses and supports the rights of same sex couples to share fully and equally in the rights, responsibilities and commitments of civil marriage." Bravo.

Today's Gay Wisdom:

Mae West

Goodness had nothing to do with it, dearie. - in response to an exclamation, "Goodness! What lovely diamonds!"

I only like two kinds of men, domestic and imported. - I'm No Angel (1933)

When I'm good, I'm very good. When I'm bad, I'm better. - I'm No Angel (1933)

I used to be Snow White, but I drifted. - I'm No Angel (1933)

Between two evils, I generally like to pick the one I never tried before. - Klondike Annie (1936)

A man in the house is worth two in the street. - Belle of the Nineties

It's not the men in your life that matters, it's the life in your men. - I'm No Angel (1933)

When women go wrong, men go right after them. - She Done Him Wrong

One and one is two; two and two is four; and "five will get you ten" if you work it right! - My Little Chickadee

I feel like a million tonight. But one at a time. - Myra Breckinridge

To a young actor: How tall are you without your horse? Six foot, seven inches. Never mind the six feet. Let's talk about the seven inches! - Myra Breckinridge

An orgasm a day keeps the doctor away.

On handling men: Tell the pretty ones they're smart and tell the smart ones they're pretty.

Give a man a free hand and he'll run it all over you.

He who hesitates is a damned fool.

His mother should have thrown him away and kept the stork.

I believe in censorship. I made a fortune out of it.

I consider sex a misdemeanor; the more I miss, de meaner I get.

I do all my best work in bed.

It is better to be looked over than be overlooked.

Love conquers all things except poverty and a toothache.

Marriage is a fine institution, but I'm not ready for an institution.

Men are like Cigars, If you don't attend to them, they go out.

Sex is an emotion in motion.

Sex is like bridge; if you don't have a good partner, you better have a good hand.

Sex with love is the greatest thing in life. But sex without love — that's not so bad either.

She's the kind of girl who climbed the ladder of success wrong by wrong.

Too much of a good thing can be simply wonderful.

You can say what you like about long dresses, but they cover a multitude of shins.

You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough.

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